Platinum At Campbelltown
Platinum – until 20 April, Seniors Week: 9-13 April; Campbelltown Art Gallery open daily 10-4;cnr Camden and Appin Roads; ph: 4645 4100
Public art galleries in outer Sydney like those at Penrith, Casula and Campbelltown regularly mount interesting and sometimes provocative shows, as do regional galleries such as Bathurst and Orange. Yet they get scant coverage from the resident art critics of the mainstream media, a deficiency which must have an impact on their visitation.
A case in point is Platinum, the show currently at Campbelltown Arts Centre. Commissioned in a boldly imaginative stroke by the Department of Ageing, Disability and Home Care to commemorate 50 years of Seniors Week in NSW, the show comprises 16 large colour photographs of seniors from around NSW by award-winning artist Petrina Hicks.
The portraits demand attention, compelling the viewer to focus on the faces of older people; people who are so often invisible, or feel themselves to be, in contemporary society. In an era when we value the ephemeral attractions of botoxed and surgically enhanced celebrities and discount the deeper beauty of wisdom and experience, this is a novelty. To study these older faces, with their mix of humour, sadness, the occasional touch of defiance, is to gain a depth of insight into character that is conspicuously absent from the airbrushed, implausible faces we see in glossy magazines. There’s no attempt to hide or minimise the effect of ageing; on the contrary, its signs are celebrated in these strong and moving portraits.
And it’s an arresting mix in the demographic sense as well, a miscellany of different ethnic types which simply emphasises the great diversity of physiognomies in Australia today and the impossibility of defining an "Aussie" look. It’s also something of a change for Hicks, whose work is represented in all major Australian galleries, and who is best known for her striking portraits of young people, using the techniques of commercial photography but subtly subverting them to produce startlingly different, discomfiting effects. Here, with age as she does with youth, she finds beauty in perceived imperfections.
The exhibition is accompanied by a hard cover, limited edition publication designed by Suzanne Boccalatte, containing all 16 photographs, with a preface by Dr Meredith Jones commenting on prevailing notions of youth and old age. This will be launched at Campbelltown Arts Centre on 11 April as part of Campbelltown Arts Centre’s 2008 Seniors Week program of events. It’s worth mentioning that the beautiful concertina-style brochure for this show is likely to become a collector’s item.
It has to be said that many of the events to mark Seniors Week (I write as a senior) – old-time music concerts and the like – are worthy rather than exciting, designed to appeal to the widest possible audience of over-60s. This show is different. By commissioning the gifted Hicks, the Department and the Centre have made the Seniors Week concept more appealing, opening it up to anyone within range around Sydney who is seriously interested in photography – or just good art – as well as to the locals who regularly visit this superb, recently expanded gallery and its excellent cafe.
Also showing at the Centre (until 20 April) is a strong exhibition of photographs by and of Aboriginal men, curated by Djon Mundine and including such artists as Michael Riley, Ricky Maynard and Mervyn Bishop.
